Albatross
by AmazingGraceless
Summary: No one expected a happy ending for River Tam- least of all herself. But with Luke and their daughter, she got a happy middle. With the Empire looming in the background as the First Order, and echoes in the Force that never went away, she is the beginning of the path that leads to the Jedi Praxeum in flames. (Current movie canon, a little AU for the Firefly characters)


When Luke Skywalker thought about how it all went wrong, he dreamed of Tatooine. Not as how he knew it as a boy, fighting of Tusken Raiders, ducking under Jabba, or racing down Beggar's Canyon with boyish abandon. Nor as that day that he became a man, the day that his home turned to ash because of the Empire. Nor the day he returned, to rescue his best friend.

No, the nights when he wondered what went wrong, he dreamed of the first time he returned with his daughter.

* * *

It was five years after his sister earned her title of the Huttslayer. The suns were still high enough in the sky that it didn't turn it violet, like the night before Luke became the greatest hero in the galaxy. But it would, soon, Luke reckoned as he stepped towards the ashes of the Lars homestead.

The fires were as dead as the people who burned in it, and what was left of the home, what precious little there was, was buried by the sand and wind.

"Sand and time, it's everywhere."

Luke heard the crunch of combat boots against the packed sand. He didn't turn. He could sense her presence. It was as vast and wild as the galaxy itself. There was darkness, yes— but among a sea of stars.

"I can hear them," River said. "Sad and beautiful. Blue like the water. The water was here, once."

"My mother was here?"

"Once. Beautiful but sad. He was angry."

"My father?"

River nodded. "He was here."

There was something poignant about the phrase. There might have been silence, if it weren't for River again.

She shifted, adjusting the weight in her arms.

"Do you want me to carry her?"

River rolled her eyes. "No power in the 'verse can stop me."

"Don't I know it."

For a moment, the Skywalkers were happy. Luke looked to his girls. Kira was only two months old. He was a father, and River a mother. These roles. . . They were unfathomable for him. Yet time had come all the same.

"Aunt Beru showed me the setting suns when I first came to Tatooine, she said," Luke reminisced. "I wonder if Old Ben was the one who brought me."

"You're home," River said. "We always come back home."

"I guess we do." He placed an arm around her— an offering that River accepted.

"She's watching," River said, after a moment. "The little sun. Little shadow. She's both. We knew she was both."

Luke winced slightly. It wasn't until the birth certificate had already been signed and filed that Simon informed them that Kira didn't just mean light, like it did on Tatooine.

"On Coruscant, it means 'dark,'" Simon said.

"You don't think the naming stuff means anything, do you?" Kaylee asked, planting her hands on her hips. "It's just something to call them by, other than, 'hey you.'"

"I can tell from personal experience that names are an important thing," Book added. "It is better to be careful, with a name and what it means, than to choose one randomly."

"Kira will be just fine," Simon added hastily. "I just thought it might be better if you didn't tempt the light-side-dark-side in your family."

"She is both," River'd announced, marking the end of that discussion.

* * *

Yes, Luke remembered that sunset on Tatooine more clearly than any other, save perhaps the one before the Death Star happened.

When he woke to the bedside cold next to him, he realized every morning that Anch-To really was the safest place for him.

After what happened, the middle of nowhere was the only place where Simon couldn't find him and kill him for what happened to River.

Luke never wanted it to happen. But the galaxy didn't seem to have much preference for what he wanted.

* * *

"Kaylee!" Mal hung in the threshold to the engine room. Humming and sparking in an irregular melody, this was the heart of _Serenity_. "Got that hyperdrive fixed yet?"

"Almost, Cap'n!"

Among her shouts, he could hear the pitter-patter of her brats in combat boots. Force, he was getting too old.

"Well, get on it then, because we're jumping to lightspeed as soon as we leave Persephone," Mal said. "The Hapans pay well, but they don't take kindly to space pirates, do they?"

"No, sir."

Mal whirled around to see Jayne cock a blaster back.

"'Course, if I had my way, we'd be stealing from the Hapans, since they got more jewels than anybody knows what to do with," Jayne said.

"Except you, I reckon," Mal muttered. "Jayne, don't make a fool of yourself— as hard as that is for you."

Jayne rolled his eyes as Mal brushed past.

A glance told him that Simon was working, and Zoe and Emma were prepping for the launch, as he made his way through _Serenity_ to where the cargo bay was— where Inara would be waiting for them.

He ran a hand through his hair— he always got so damn nervous, never mind that mess had been straightened out for many years now. Not marriage— neither was the marrying kind.

But they'd come to an agreement of sorts.

Mal continued through _Serenity_, until finally— finally— he was standing over the cargo bay, watching as the door opened. First entered the bodyguards— pretty boys in armor meant to attract rather than protect. One tapped his commlink in his ear, prompting a figure to step into the beloved ship.

Inara Serra was much older now than she once was. But still just as lovely, and the years didn't show themselves on her face like they did Mal's.

_Kriffing Hapans._

Still, he couldn't help a smirk as he descended the stairs, approaching the Hapan Ambassador.

"Call of space finally get to you?"

"In a manner of speaking." There was always that coyness about her.

Mal shoved his hands in his pocket. "How long you staying this time?"

Inara met his eyes. "I'm not sure. Longer than last time, at least."

"Bringing the entourage?" Mal nodded at the bodyguards. "If so, I'm gonna need to start finding some—"

"They're not coming." Inara turned to the bodyguards. "Thank you for your service to House Madrassa."

The bodyguards nodded, and one-by-one headed away, leaving the Hapan noble and the space pirate alone.

Emma shut the door, before darting away to leave the couple in peace.

"We'll be going to lightspeed as soon as we're off-planet," Mal said, offering his arm to Inara.

She pursed her lips a moment before accepting it. "If we're going to try again, Mal, you have to understand— this is it. The last time."

There was an urgency— an unspoken plea in her eyes. They never did talk about the miscarriages— and what else they discovered that day.

"Not much time, then?" They entered where the passenger seats were—where Emma, Simon, Kaylee, Jayne, and the kids were strapping themselves in. "Seems to be common among us folk."

"Yes." He knew who Inara was thinking of.

Shepherd Book. Wash. River.

_Serenity_ was losing her crew, one-by-one. Would there come a time when she would be empty, or worse, flown by a bunch of strangers?

"I'll be up in the cockpit," Mal said. "Got an albatross waiting there for me, just like her mother."

Inara just smiled, a sadness betraying her true age in her dark eyes.

Recent years had been kinder to them, after the war was over and the New Republic rose. The Resistance had more credits than the Alliance ever did, and that meant that Kaylee complained less about impossible mechanical jobs.

In some places, the shiny parts made her unrecognizable.

The second he ducked his head in the cockpit, Mal could've sworn he saw two ghosts. The first sitting in the chair he came to occupy after that horrible day near the Maw, muttering something as he moved around the dinosaur toys that littered the dashboard even after their owner passed.

Or became one with the Force, as Luke liked to say.

The second was more in the girl who sat there. Had her daddy's blonde hair, was a little more filled-in because of him, but the way she wore her hair, the expressions on her face?

That was all River Tam.

"Ri— Kira!"

She spun around her chair, the expression on her face that strangely serene one of her mother's— with all of the impatience, too.

"Ready to fire, Uncle Mal."

"Good, best we keep it tight," Mal said as he strapped himself into his half of the cockpit. "The General's expecting the Ambassador right-quick, and I don't have half a mind to disobey her."

"Mostly because of what happened last time," Kira muttered.

"To be fair, it wasn't my fault that we had to haul ass and go help Han with the kriffing rathtars," Mal said.

"They would've been fine," Kira said as she started ignition.

"Half the crew died!"

"Well, Han shouldn't have been hauling rathtars." Her righteous attitude was all Simon and Luke, Mal decided.

"That might be true, but that's not the point," Mal decided. "Point is, we need to launch pronto, before the General decides to unleash her Jedi wrath or whatever."

"Wrath is the way of the dark side." Kira had gone very quiet.

"Well, I've never been the light-side kind of man," Mal said.

"Mal means bad."

Her voice echoed her mother— she had once said the same thing.

Damn, he was getting too old for this.

Kira started the flight sequence, and legs withdrew into _Serenity_. The lifts turned on, and the ship uneasily hovered.

She flicked a switch, and Mal punched in the hyperspace coordinates for D'Qaar. She then grabbed the joystick handles, thrusting it forward. The atmosphere of Persephone was disappearing right before their very eyes.

Right as they hit the black, Kira turned the hyperspace drive, and then pushed the lever. With the kickback, the back of Mal's head thudded against the chair as blue and white lines streaked his vision. Then _Serenity_ stabilized, and he undid the restraints.

"Best check on the rest of the crew." He approached Kira from behind, and clapped a hand on her shoulder. "We're making good time. She would've been proud."

He turned away— he wasn't sure he could stand to see her smile. He was getting too old for this, too old and soft after so many losses.


End file.
